


Because It's You and Me

by Mysti_Fogg



Series: Madelaine Shepard [1]
Category: Mass Effect Trilogy
Genre: Canon Compliant, F/M, Friends With Benefits, Interspecies Romance, One Night Stands, Paragon Commander Shepard, Spacer (Mass Effect), Vanguard (Mass Effect), War Hero (Mass Effect)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-09
Updated: 2017-09-11
Packaged: 2018-12-25 16:44:03
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 2,821
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12040020
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mysti_Fogg/pseuds/Mysti_Fogg
Summary: Shepard and Vakarian's night together before the Omega-4 Relay.





	1. Omega-4 Relay ETA 12 hours

_Omega-4 Relay ETA 12 hours_

"I just want something to go right for a change. Just once. Just..." Garrus sounds so lost. 

Shepard bows her head to his as she's seen turians do to express affection, closing the distance between them.

He tentatively reaches for her shoulder. His grip firms up as she remains still, and somehow the gentle pressure makes her feel more solid.

She lifts her head slowly to catch one of his mandibles with a gentle kiss, and looks up into his blue eyes. They still seem to be trying to figure her out.

"You don't need to worry so much. No matter what happens, I've already decided tonight is going to be one to treasure." Her voice projects confidence, but this time it isn't the Commander Shepard mask speaking, but an older woman realizing she's taking a younger lover. A different role, but she'll play it for him.

"How can you be so certain?" A direct question with no deflections. She can't tell if he's asking about now or always. 

"Because it's you and me, Garrus. You're my best friend in this screwed-up galaxy." She tosses his words back at him gently. "Even if we're nervous and awkward, we're also kind of right whenever we're together." She puts a hand to his shoulder, mirroring him, and begins rubbing soothing little circles with her thumb. 

He peers at her intensely as he clasps both her shoulders, and lifts, pulling her to her tiptoes. It's not a sexy gaze, more one of a cop going over testimony and trying to slot all the clues together. She can feel herself smiling a bit foolishly. She enjoys seeing the cogs spinning away behind his eyes. She moves her own hands to his shoulders, resting them lightly on top. "You know, human men have been trying to understand human women for centuries and they still claim to be baffled. I don't think you're going to solve the mystery in one night." 

"Maybe I've found the clue they overlooked." His mandibles flare in amusement.

"Maybe." She agrees. "Close your eyes."

"Giving me orders?"

"About as much as you're plotting to interrogate me."

"Oh." He loosens his grip and looks away.

"No." She leans forward and licks his other mandible, causing him to look at her, startled. "That's not what I meant."

"See... now we're getting the interspecies awkwardness thing."

"No. We're not. It's the same awkwardness thing we've had since we agreed to try this. Now. Close your eyes."

"Alright, Shepard."

She looks at his trustingly closed eyes with a moment of worry, calculating the right words. They need to be true, she's certain of that. 

"When I propositioned you." Ugh, too clinical, she thinks. But also too late to take it back and start over. "You didn't exactly take long to think it over before you said, 'Yes, definitely.'" She lightly nibbles at the underside of his jaw, which elicits some interesting twitches.

"Mmmmm...."

"You didn't really think it over at all. You just followed what you felt. Yes?"

"Ye-es."

She trails fingers along the vulnerable skin of his neck, and feels him shiver. "And that feeling hasn't changed?"

"No."

She steps fully up against him and runs her fingers over his scalp, just below his fringe, and hears him moan in need. "Then you've got all the important points figured out, even if you don't realize it yet." She kisses him on the mouth as certainly as if she's always done so. 

His arms pull her in tighter, hands dropping to stroke along her spine, digging in at her hips and making her groan in response. With that small bit of encouragement, he continues to rub and stroke until she climbs him, wrapping her legs around his waist. He carries her to the bed as their tensions evaporate.


	2. Omega-4 Relay ETA 10 hours

_Omega-4 Relay ETA 10 hours_

Garrus runs a talon lightly along Shepard's side, marveling at her pliable skin. He's so used to seeing humans in armor that he doesn't usually think about how fragile they are without natural plates. 

His lover seems to glow with contentment. Shepard. She's Shepard some part of his brain protests. It's still a confusing notion that he is here with her. 

He realizes he's staring at her in the dim glow of the fish tank. He tries to think of something clever to say, but instead blurts out "You're beautiful." He hadn't appreciated that before because she has curves where he's instinctively used to sharp lines. She's a work of art in a style he only understands now.

Her blush floods down her chest, followed by the slightest flex of her fingers as if to grab covers and retreat beneath them. She doesn't though. _Interesting._ She lifts her chin to look him in the eye, "You're not so bad yourself." She reaches out to touch his scarred face again.

"So you really do have a thing for scars."

"Don't tell Wrex. I already have more krogan breeding requests than I want."

"I seem to recall someone telling me I was so ugly I needed a coat of face paint to cover up."

"You are a master of face paint." She runs a finger over his unscarred cheek. "But... ummm.. yes. I like scars. To me, scars come from being alive. Whatever you did to earn your scars, they make you who you are right now. Mistakes and lessons that you're not allowed to forget. I'm hoping you learn how to duck sometime in the near future."

He strokes her arm, idly counting the little reddish brown spots on her pale skin. "And what kind of lessons did these teach you?"

She looks down and chuckles. "They're freckles, Garrus, not scars. Mostly they tell me to stay out of the sun. And since I grew up in the artificial light of a spaceship, that hasn't been hard." She sighs. "I don't have scars any more, not since Cerberus. And according to Dr. Chakwas, I never will again."

"I guess I'll have to get enough for the both of us." Hmmm... that may have come out wrong, as if they were going to stay together... 

She punches him hard in the shoulder, "Don't you dare. Don't you ever dare. You scared the shit out of me on Omega. You don't need double that etched into your face." 

He's surprised by the sudden emotion, but then he's never seen her scars and has no idea what might have caused any of them. Other than dying. She was dead. She was dead and he was never supposed to see her again. And then he would have died alone. 

"It was a bad joke." He can see the slightest opening to say something important to her, but he doesn't know what the words should be. Instead, he pulls her in close. 

She punches his shoulder several times, worked up in a rage he's more used to on the battlefield. He pins her arms easily, with a bit of a growl at her taking advantage of an opening to talk for an attack. It seems to be the right thing. If she wanted to be free of him, she could send him flying across the room with a thought. Instead, she begins to make love to him again, with a possessive ferocity. Her nails and teeth are too blunt to do any harm, and he's on familiar territory with this kind of tightly wound wrestling match. The difficult part is really keeping enough control of himself to ensure she doesn't overenthusiastically wrench her shoulder struggling against his grip.

There's a moment when he thinks he may have read her wrong, and he's surrounded by blue sparks. But that turns into an insidious caress of all the sensitive bits of skin under the joinings of his plates.

At the end, they lay again quiet, panting, then breathing slowly with sleep.


	3. Omega-4 Relay ETA 3 hours

_Omega-4 Relay ETA 3 hours_

Shepard cracks an amber eye and watches Garrus sleep where he's draped over her breasts. He whistles softly with each breath, with the subharmonics adding a small vibration. She wonders if this is some turian kind of snoring. If so, she hopes it never stops. 

She can feel the bruises disappearing from her body every second that she lays here, leaving her unmarked again. Perhaps she should apologize for ... well ... all of that. Make sure he's not hurt ... through that suit of armor he just naturally wears to bed under his skin. So maybe she doesn't need to apologize.

The talons of his foot curl under, and then stretch to the fullest extent where his right leg dangles off the bed, and the whistling stops. He's awake.

"You need to stop doing that, Shepard, or I'm going to think you need a stress release all the time."

"Stop doing what?"

"That thing." He crosses his arms over her ribs.

"What thing?"

He smirks as he runs a lazy talon tip back and forth between her breasts. "That thing where you tighten up your muscles right in here the moment you know someone is watching."

He's a bit too far away to shut up with a kiss, so she makes an inarticulate grumble.

"When you're sniping, tension will ruin your shot. The key is control." He stretches one long arm out to gently cup her cheek, as if propping up a gun. He balances the other on top of her at an imaginary trigger. "Breath slow, eye on the target." He lines up his shot right between her eyes. "Then you force yourself to relax in that natural pause between breaths." And she feels the muscles in his chest settle where they rest over her belly, his finger twitches. "And then you breathe again." And he's just himself, looking at her. "You need to learn how to breathe."

She can feel the knot in her own chest that's still pulled tight. She tries out several replies in her head, from laughing it off to telling him to go even though she doesn't want this one night together to end. Because then there are only death and destruction in her future. Looking into his face and seeing the concern, her chest only tightens up more. He has her pinned with words and no acceptable way out. 

"And this is what I get for sleeping with an expert tactician and detective," she catches the hand on her cheek in her own, "I do know better, but I love how your mind works." 

"My mind is noticing that you're trying to be distracting."

"Damn. Didn't work." She slides into a peculiar five-on-three grip of his hand and kisses the back. "I am perfectly capable of breathing correctly in a fight."

"Not the actual point, Shepard." His eyes will always seem a bit predatory to her, but it's something of a relief that he's not willing to let up the pursuit of her problems.

"Do you really want me to talk your ear off about myself? Because I'm not sure I even know how to do that." She feels like she's looking down at him from over the top of a huge wall. It's a nice view.

"Is it a matter of trust?" His voice seems light, but she's certain everything could go wrong in an instant. Which is why she doesn't speak about herself any more than she has to. But ... he's worth talking to, if only she could find the words.

"It's... I don't ... I don't even think about," she waves her free hand in the air, "everything." She tugs at his hand, encouraging him to lay beside her. And then, noticing how generally lacking in support the bed is for someone with a carapace, she begins moving pillows around with her biotics to make him more comfortable while she tries to find the words. "I ... most of the time, I'm alone. All the decisions are mine. And all of the mistakes. And everyone is watching me. The crew needs me to be Commander Shepard. So I am. And the marines tell everyone what Commander Shepard is, so ... that's what I am. And the media wants to write the story, so I play a good story for them. The world is full of expectations. So... um... maybe I ... just spend all my time meeting them and forget about less important things like breathing."

When Garrus begins choking and convulsing during her difficult and mangled explanation, her immediate reaction is to roll over to the bedside table and get out the dextro epi-pen she'd stocked for tonight in case he got anaphylactic shock. He catches her hand before she can apply it to him, and it finally registers that he's laughing too hard to stop.

Humiliated, something she hadn't thought would possibly happen, she regrets inviting him to her bed, and throws the epi-pen across the room. She leaps to her feet to escape. 

He has reach, though, and grabs her arm before she can stalk into the shower and put distance between the two of them again.

"No." He chokes. "Shepard. Please. Wait."

She struggles for control of herself and succeeds in standing perfectly still.

"I'm sorry. I can't help it." He coughs to clear his throat. "Will you look at me? Please?"

Please and sorry carry a lot of weight, and she's finally able to turn to face him. Her feet on the floor grow cold. She looks pointedly at where he's holding her arm, but he doesn't let go.

"Let me... Look, the joke's on me," he says sheepishly.

"What joke?" Her tones are acid.

"I never thought I fit into the Hierarchy, all those rules and regulations just seem to get in the way of everything, and so I got off planet to the Citadel where I could deal with aliens and not have all these rules. Of course, the turians ran C-Sec, so that didn't quite go as planned and there I was drowning in rules and regs again. And then I join up with the human spectre, and my career goes completely off track but I don't care even though my entire upbringing says I should. And then I run off to Omega to work as a vigilante where no one can find me and tell me what to do. I really am a very bad turian." He shakes his head and gulps in air, trying to ward off further choking laughter. "And now I'm in bed with a human, thinking this is about as far from what I _should_ be doing with my life as I can get, and as you're talking, I finally realize that all the running and trying to figure out what to do with myself on my own, I'm actually with the exact woman my family would want, other than that human detail. You're all duty and military service and you inspire me to do exactly what Hierarchy would want me to do: duty, loyalty, hard work, sacrifice. The only difference is that they'd want to micromanage the whole thing and you've got me managing myself."

He takes a deep breath and draws her back into bed, "Apparently, I'm not that great of a rebel, since you're the center of my universe."

She falls into his arms willingly, beginning to have a fit of giggles. "We are the world's best joke," she says as she burrows under the covers with him. "I won't allow myself to escape my duties or say no to any of the 1,000 tasks I'm assigned, so I spend my life with a man fighting against them at every turn." 

The horrible knot of tension she has always carried is gone.


	4. Omega-4 Relay ETA 2 hours

_Omega-4 Relay ETA 2 hours_

Garrus runs his fingers through her wet hair, cleaning out the soap and enjoying the scent. "I'm blaming you if the Collectors target me because I'm too shiny."

Shepard pauses with her scrub brush. "It's not my fault you're a little bit metallic."

"I'm a sniper, I'm not supposed to be seen." 

She sighs and switches to a washcloth. "This wouldn't be a problem if you had replaced the armor with holes in it."

"I've finally ..."

"Got it broken in? Yeah. I've heard that one before. Buy yourself some new armor when we get out of this. Cerberus is paying."

"You know you love the Archangel look."

"I do. But I love the structural integrity of armor more." 

They dry off in a tangle of towels and appendages. He pulls on his clothes from the night before while she puts on the undersuit for her armor. 

She steps up to him and slips his visor back into place. He leans down, and their foreheads touch. 

_The center of my universe...  
The man I spend my life with ... _

It feels true and right and suddenly he has so much to live for, even if this is only ever going to be one night.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It's my headcanon that Shepard and Garrus are always soulmates, whether it's BroShep or FemShep, paragon or renegade, romanced or unromanced.
> 
> I consider a soulmate in terms of someone who makes you feel happy and fulfilled to be around even if gender or species preferences get in the way of romantic intimacy. You just get each other in a way no one else ever will.
> 
> There is no Shepard without Vakarian.


End file.
